Package	com.greensock.loading
Class	public class VideoLoader
Inheritance	VideoLoader LoaderItem LoaderCore flash.events.EventDispatcher

You don't need to worry about creating a NetConnection, a Video object, attaching the NetStream, or any of the typical hassles. VideoLoader can even scale the video into the area you specify using scaleModes like "stretch", "proportionalInside", "proportionalOutside", and more. A VideoLoader will dispatch useful events like VIDEO_COMPLETE, VIDEO_PAUSE, VIDEO_PLAY, VIDEO_BUFFER_FULL, VIDEO_BUFFER_EMPTY, NET_STATUS, VIDEO_CUE_POINT, and PLAY_PROGRESS in addition to the typical loader events, making it easy to hook up your own control interface. It packs a surprising amount of functionality into a very small amount of kb.

OPTIONAL VARS PROPERTIES

The following special properties can be passed into the VideoLoader constructor via its vars parameter which can be either a generic object or a VideoLoaderVars object:

• name : String - A name that is used to identify the VideoLoader instance. This name can be fed to the LoaderMax.getLoader() or LoaderMax.getContent() methods or traced at any time. Each loader's name should be unique. If you don't define one, a unique name will be created automatically, like "loader21".
• bufferTime : Number - The amount of time (in seconds) that should be buffered before the video can begin playing (set autoPlay to false to pause the video initially).
• autoPlay : Boolean - By default, the video will begin playing as soon as it has been adequately buffered, but to prevent it from playing initially, set autoPlay to false.
• smoothing : Boolean - When smoothing is true (the default), smoothing will be enabled for the video which typically leads to better scaling results.
• container : DisplayObjectContainer - A DisplayObjectContainer into which the ContentDisplay should be added immediately.
• width : Number - Sets the ContentDisplay's width property (applied before rotation, scaleX, and scaleY).
• height : Number - Sets the ContentDisplay's height property (applied before rotation, scaleX, and scaleY).
• centerRegistration : Boolean - if true, the registration point will be placed in the center of the ContentDisplay which can be useful if, for example, you want to animate its scale and have it grow/shrink from its center.
• scaleMode : String - When a width and height are defined, the scaleMode controls how the video will be scaled to fit the area. The following values are recognized (you may use the com.greensock.layout.ScaleMode constants if you prefer):
  • "stretch" (the default) - The video will fill the width/height exactly.
  • "proportionalInside" - The video will be scaled proportionally to fit inside the area defined by the width/height
  • "proportionalOutside" - The video will be scaled proportionally to completely fill the area, allowing portions of it to exceed the bounds defined by the width/height.
  • "widthOnly" - Only the width of the video will be adjusted to fit.
  • "heightOnly" - Only the height of the video will be adjusted to fit.
  • "none" - No scaling of the video will occur.
• hAlign : String - When a width and height are defined, the hAlign determines how the video is horizontally aligned within that area. The following values are recognized (you may use the com.greensock.layout.AlignMode constants if you prefer):
  • "center" (the default) - The video will be centered horizontally in the area
  • "left" - The video will be aligned with the left side of the area
  • "right" - The video will be aligned with the right side of the area
• vAlign : String - When a width and height are defined, the vAlign determines how the video is vertically aligned within that area. The following values are recognized (you may use the com.greensock.layout.AlignMode constants if you prefer):
  • "center" (the default) - The video will be centered vertically in the area
  • "top" - The video will be aligned with the top of the area
  • "bottom" - The video will be aligned with the bottom of the area
• crop : Boolean - When a width and height are defined, setting crop to true will cause the video to be cropped within that area (by applying a scrollRect for maximum performance). This is typically useful when the scaleMode is "proportionalOutside" or "none" so that any parts of the video that exceed the dimensions defined by width and height are visually chopped off. Use the hAlign and vAlign special properties to control the vertical and horizontal alignment within the cropped area.
• x : Number - Sets the ContentDisplay's x property (for positioning on the stage).
• y : Number - Sets the ContentDisplay's y property (for positioning on the stage).
• scaleX : Number - Sets the ContentDisplay's scaleX property.
• scaleY : Number - Sets the ContentDisplay's scaleY property.
• rotation : Number - Sets the ContentDisplay's rotation property.
• alpha : Number - Sets the ContentDisplay's alpha property.
• visible : Boolean - Sets the ContentDisplay's visible property.
• blendMode : String - Sets the ContentDisplay's blendMode property.
• bgColor : uint - When a width and height are defined, a rectangle will be drawn inside the ContentDisplay immediately in order to ease the development process. It is transparent by default, but you may define a bgAlpha if you prefer.
• bgAlpha : Number - Controls the alpha of the rectangle that is drawn when a width and height are defined.
• volume : Number - A value between 0 and 1 indicating the volume at which the video should play (default is 1).
• repeat : int - Number of times that the video should repeat. To repeat indefinitely, use -1. Default is 0.
• stageVideo : StageVideo - By default, the NetStream gets attached to a Video object, but if you want to use StageVideo in Flash, you can define the stageVideo property and VideoLoader will attach its NetStream to that StageVideo instance instead of the regular Video instance (which is the rawContent). Please read Adobe's docs regarding StageVideo to understand the benefits, tradeoffs and limitations.
• checkPolicyFile : Boolean - If true, the VideoLoader will check for a crossdomain.xml file on the remote host (only useful when loading videos from other domains - see Adobe's docs for details about NetStream's checkPolicyFile property).
• estimatedDuration : Number - Estimated duration of the video in seconds. VideoLoader will only use this value until it receives the necessary metaData from the video in order to accurately determine the video's duration. You do not need to specify an estimatedDuration, but doing so can help make the playProgress and some other values more accurate (until the metaData has loaded). It can also make the progress/bytesLoaded/bytesTotal more accurate when a estimatedDuration is defined, particularly in bufferMode.
• deblocking : int - Indicates the type of filter applied to decoded video as part of post-processing. The default value is 0, which lets the video compressor apply a deblocking filter as needed. See Adobe's flash.media.Video class docs for details.
• bufferMode : Boolean - When true, the loader will report its progress only in terms of the video's buffer which can be very convenient if, for example, you want to display loading progress for the video's buffer or tuck it into a LoaderMax with other loaders and allow the LoaderMax to dispatch its COMPLETE event when the buffer is full instead of waiting for the whole file to download. When bufferMode is true, the VideoLoader will dispatch its COMPLETE event when the buffer is full as opposed to waiting for the entire video to load. You can toggle the bufferMode anytime. Please read the full bufferMode property ASDoc description below for details about how it affects things like bytesTotal.
• autoAdjustBuffer : Boolean If the buffer becomes empty during playback and autoAdjustBuffer is true (the default), it will automatically attempt to adjust the NetStream's bufferTime based on the rate at which the video has been loading, estimating what it needs to be in order to play the rest of the video without emptying the buffer again. This can prevent the annoying problem of video playback start/stopping/starting/stopping on a system tht doesn't have enough bandwidth to adequately buffer the video. You may also set the bufferTime in the constructor's vars parameter to set the initial value.
• autoDetachNetStream : Boolean - If true, the NetStream will only be attached to the Video object (the rawContent) when it is in the display list (on the stage). This conserves memory but it can cause a very brief rendering delay when the content is initially added to the stage (often imperceptible). Also, if you add it to the stage when the videoTime is after its last encoded keyframe, it will render at that last keyframe.
• alternateURL : String - If you define an alternateURL, the loader will initially try to load from its original url and if it fails, it will automatically (and permanently) change the loader's url to the alternateURL and try again. Think of it as a fallback or backup url. It is perfectly acceptable to use the same alternateURL for multiple loaders (maybe a default image for various ImageLoaders for example).
• noCache : Boolean - If noCache is true, a "gsCacheBusterID" parameter will be appended to the url with a random set of numbers to prevent caching (don't worry, this info is ignored when you getLoader() or getContent() by url and when you're running locally)
• estimatedBytes : uint - Initially, the loader's bytesTotal is set to the estimatedBytes value (or LoaderMax.defaultEstimatedBytes if one isn't defined). Then, when the loader begins loading and it can accurately determine the bytesTotal, it will do so. Setting estimatedBytes is optional, but the more accurate the value, the more accurate your loaders' overall progress will be initially. If the loader will be inserted into a LoaderMax instance (for queue management), its auditSize feature can attempt to automatically determine the bytesTotal at runtime (there is a slight performance penalty for this, however - see LoaderMax's documentation for details).
• requireWithRoot : DisplayObject - LoaderMax supports subloading, where an object can be factored into a parent's loading progress. If you want LoaderMax to require this VideoLoader as part of its parent SWFLoader's progress, you must set the requireWithRoot property to your swf's root. For example, var loader:VideoLoader = new VideoLoader("myScript.php", {name:"textData", requireWithRoot:this.root});
• allowMalformedURL : Boolean - Normally, the URL will be parsed and any variables in the query string (like "?name=test&state=il&gender=m") will be placed into a URLVariables object which is added to the URLRequest. This avoids a few bugs in Flash, but if you need to keep the entire URL intact (no parsing into URLVariables), set allowMalformedURL:true. For example, if your URL has duplicate variables in the query string like http://www.greensock.com/?c=S&c=SE&c=SW, it is technically considered a malformed URL and a URLVariables object can't properly contain all the duplicates, so in this case you'd want to set allowMalformedURL to true.
• autoDispose : Boolean - When autoDispose is true, the loader will be disposed immediately after it completes (it calls the dispose() method internally after dispatching its COMPLETE event). This will remove any listeners that were defined in the vars object (like onComplete, onProgress, onError, onInit). Once a loader is disposed, it can no longer be found with LoaderMax.getLoader() or LoaderMax.getContent() - it is essentially destroyed but its content is not unloaded (you must call unload() or dispose(true) to unload its content). The default autoDispose value is false.

  ----EVENT HANDLER SHORTCUTS----

• onOpen : Function - A handler function for LoaderEvent.OPEN events which are dispatched when the loader begins loading. Make sure your onOpen function accepts a single parameter of type LoaderEvent (com.greensock.events.LoaderEvent).
• onInit : Function - A handler function for Event.INIT events which will be called when the video's metaData has been received and the video is placed into the ContentDisplay. The INIT event can be dispatched more than once if the NetStream receives metaData more than once (which occasionally happens, particularly with F4V files - the first time often doesn't include the cuePoints). Make sure your onInit function accepts a single parameter of type Event (flash.events.Event).
• onProgress : Function - A handler function for LoaderEvent.PROGRESS events which are dispatched whenever the bytesLoaded changes. Make sure your onProgress function accepts a single parameter of type LoaderEvent (com.greensock.events.LoaderEvent). You can use the LoaderEvent's target.progress to get the loader's progress value or use its target.bytesLoaded and target.bytesTotal.
• onComplete : Function - A handler function for LoaderEvent.COMPLETE events which are dispatched when the loader has finished loading successfully. Make sure your onComplete function accepts a single parameter of type LoaderEvent (com.greensock.events.LoaderEvent).
• onCancel : Function - A handler function for LoaderEvent.CANCEL events which are dispatched when loading is aborted due to either a failure or because another loader was prioritized or cancel() was manually called. Make sure your onCancel function accepts a single parameter of type LoaderEvent (com.greensock.events.LoaderEvent).
• onError : Function - A handler function for LoaderEvent.ERROR events which are dispatched whenever the loader experiences an error (typically an IO_ERROR). An error doesn't necessarily mean the loader failed, however - to listen for when a loader fails, use the onFail special property. Make sure your onError function accepts a single parameter of type LoaderEvent (com.greensock.events.LoaderEvent).
• onFail : Function - A handler function for LoaderEvent.FAIL events which are dispatched whenever the loader fails and its status changes to LoaderStatus.FAILED. Make sure your onFail function accepts a single parameter of type LoaderEvent (com.greensock.events.LoaderEvent).
• onIOError : Function - A handler function for LoaderEvent.IO_ERROR events which will also call the onError handler, so you can use that as more of a catch-all whereas onIOError is specifically for LoaderEvent.IO_ERROR events. Make sure your onIOError function accepts a single parameter of type LoaderEvent (com.greensock.events.LoaderEvent).

Note: Using a VideoLoaderVars instance instead of a generic object to define your vars is a bit more verbose but provides code hinting and improved debugging because it enforces strict data typing. Use whichever one you prefer.

Note: To avoid garbage collection issues in the Flash player, the netStream object that VideoLoader employs must get recreated internally anytime the VideoLoader is unloaded or its loading is cancelled, so if you need to directly access the netStream, it is best to do so after the COMPLETE event has been dispatched. Otherwise, if you store a reference to the VideoLoader's netStream before or during a load and it gets cancelled or unloaded for some reason, it won't reference the one that was used to load the video.

Note: There is a bug/inconsistency in Adobe's NetStream class that causes relative URLs to use the swf's location as the base path instead of the HTML page's location like all other loaders. Therefore, it would be wise to use the "base" attribute of the <OBJECT> and <EMBED> tags in the HTML to make sure all relative paths are consistent. See http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/041/tn_04157.html for details.

Note: In order to minimize memory usage, VideoLoader doesn't attach the NetStream to its Video object (the rawContent) until it is added to the display list. Therefore, if your VideoLoader's content isn't somewhere on the stage, the NetStream's visual content won't be fully decoded into memory (that's a good thing). The only time this could be of consequence is if you are trying to do a BitmapData.draw() of the VideoLoader's content or rawContent when it isn't on the stage. In that case, you'd just need to attach the NetStream manually before doing your BitmapData.draw() like myVideoLoader.rawContent.attachNetStream(myVideoLoader.netStream).

 import com.greensock.loading.*;
 import com.greensock.loading.display.*;
 import com.greensock.*;
 import com.greensock.events.LoaderEvent;
 
//create a VideoLoader
var video:VideoLoader = new VideoLoader("assets/video.flv", {name:"myVideo", container:this, width:400, height:300, scaleMode:"proportionalInside", bgColor:0x000000, autoPlay:false, volume:0, requireWithRoot:this.root, estimatedBytes:75000});
//start loading
video.load();
 
//add a CLICK listener to a button that causes the video to toggle its paused state.
button.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, togglePause);
function togglePause(event:MouseEvent):void {
    video.videoPaused = !video.videoPaused;
}
//or you could put the VideoLoader into a LoaderMax queue. Create one first...
var queue:LoaderMax = new LoaderMax({name:"mainQueue", onProgress:progressHandler, onComplete:completeHandler, onError:errorHandler});
//append the VideoLoader and several other loaders
queue.append( video );
queue.append( new DataLoader("assets/data.txt", {name:"myText"}) );
queue.append( new ImageLoader("assets/image1.png", {name:"myImage", estimatedBytes:3500}) );
//start loading the LoaderMax queue
queue.load();
function progressHandler(event:LoaderEvent):void {
    trace("progress: " + event.target.progress);
}
function completeHandler(event:LoaderEvent):void {
    //play the video
    video.playVideo();
    
    //tween the volume up to 1 over the course of 2 seconds.
    TweenLite.to(video, 2, {volume:1});
}
function errorHandler(event:LoaderEvent):void {
    trace("error occured with " + event.target + ": " + event.text);
}
 

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See also